Editor:
We finally have some good news about our capability to support a clean electric future (“Billion-dollar power lines finally inching ahead to help U.S. grids,” March 7), although in New York we’re doing better than inching. The Champlain Hudson Power Express is only one of six major transmission projects the New York Power Authority is overseeing right now.
While we need a more robust grid to support the megawatts of solar and wind power coming online (together, they are growing vastly faster than natural gas, with its nearly imperceptible growth rate), there is nothing technological stopping us from adopting EVs and electric heating and cooling equipment now. These super-efficient devices would lower everybody’s utility bills, provided homes are well-insulated. In particular, energy-nibbling heat pumps save power during our increasing summer heat waves, when everybody else’s a/c is going full blast.
The All-Electric Building Act would make sure new construction would not include pricey gas hook-ups, providing clean indoor air and long-term cost and health gains for residents. The NY HEAT (Home Energy Affordable Transition) Act changes the rules that allowed gas companies to build hook-ups for residents who didn’t want them — like electric home owners — and charge us all in our service fees. NY HEAT also limits utility bills for low- and middle-income families to 6% of their earnings.
Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie and Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins must get the AEBA and NY HEAT into the one-house budget.
Joanne Scanlon
Rush
CORRECTION: A representative of Champlain Hudson Power Express contacted The Daily News following the publication of this letter to explain that the reference to its project being overseen by the New York Power Authority is inaccurate. The project is being developed by Transmission Developers (TDI) and will transmit clean hydropower supplied by Hydro-Quebec in Canada.